How Nate Clark took 5 expired listings in a month prospecting 4 to 6 hours a day

Aaron Wittenstein00:06

So I mean, looking into your business, okay? So do you have, like, a system that you go through on a daily basis?

Nate Clark00:14

Absolutely. So at this point, the bulk of my business, if I could have one lead source to prospect until the end of time and turn off everything else, it would be fresh expireds, 100%.

00:24I love fresh expireds. I love hitting them first thing when they come off the market. You know, the first day I’m hitting them at 8:00 AM. I’m dialing them again in the afternoon and in the evening. But ultimately, expireds are gonna be my number one priority. Even in a market like Austin, I still found that two-thirds of my business was coming from that.

00:41And especially with the market shifting, prices shifting, and a ton of inventory coming off of the market and expiring, that’s been something where I’ve been able to take five expired listings in a month at a couple points this year.

Aaron Wittenstein00:59

Hey everyone, what’s going on? It’s me, it’s Aaron Wittenstein, and I am here with Vulcan7 Roadmap. Our goal here is to teach you how to take an additional two, three, four, 137,363.6 listings a week. And I actually have a good friend of mine here today from the wonderful city of Austin, Texas, the skydiving real estate agent.

01:28Nate Clark, how you doing today, my friend?

Nate Clark01:31

I am doing very well, Aaron, thank you so much for having me. It’s been a whole, like, two hours since I saw you when we were doing

Aaron Wittenstein01:38

that morning prospecting. See, for those of you that don’t know, I actually prospect with a couple of people, Nate Clark being one of them.

01:44And I gotta say, as being the skydiving real estate agent, tell me about that a little bit. Can you share with everybody? ‘Cause I think it’s very important to know where that comes from and how it works to your benefit in business.

Nate Clark01:55

Absolutely, yeah. So the skydiving real estate agent is actually what I go by, and I even got it on my card.

02:00And I even got a picture of me skydiving down there with my sold sign, which is not a Photoshop. So I moved to Texas about eight years ago. I worked as a skydiving instructor. I had 4,000 jumps. I took people strapped to the front of me, doing tandem skydives. I shot video. I held on to beginner skydivers as they just, like, bucking bronco-ed through the air.

02:18So I labeled myself as a skydiving real estate agent, as you can see right there. I think it’s good to be remember-able. I had an old team leader that always told me to be remember-able, and it’s something that works well, especially with a lot of phone prospecting and stuff like that. So it’s good to be able to stand out with a bit of personal branding in addition to what you and I know is really important, is transmitting good energy to people right off the bat and just getting rocking and rolling in your calls.

Aaron Wittenstein02:42

You know, I never even thought about that. I mean, the reality of it is, is when he calls and he says, “I’m the sky real estate agent in Austin,” there’s so many realtors out that way. And I think nowadays, I think, Nate, you can agree with me on this, is there’s probably more agents calling than ever

02:57right now, and less inventory than ever. So it’s super important to be able to, once again, whether it’s a sky real estate agent, you know, whatever it is, real estate agent, to be able to stand out on the phone. And what’s so impressive about you is the way about you that you have while you’re prospecting.

03:14How many hours right now would you say that you’re lead generating on a daily basis?

Nate Clark03:18

I would say I’m probably lead generating a solid four to sometimes as much as six hours a day. So I’d been pretty typically doing two or three hours a day as standard. And in kind of meeting you and getting introduced to a great group of prospectors, it’s been really cool for me to double down and not just have the accountability to be able to make more calls, but just to have the people to kind of shoot the stuff with and have a bit more fun on the day-to-day.

03:43So I’m probably prospecting four to six hours a day. You know, 8:00 AM to noon is always gonna be blocked out for lead generating activities. Sometimes I’ll have an admin appointment in there where we do a quick Zoom meeting for 10 or 15 minutes. But other than that, the entire first half of my day is always gonna be blocked out for lead gen.

03:59If I have appointments in the afternoon or evening, I’m gonna be going on those. But outside of that, I love to hop back on my dialer around 3:00 PM and just try to make as many contacts as humanly possible.

Aaron Wittenstein04:09

So all right, so let me ask you this. For a typical, let’s just say four hour, let’s say you’re not having a superhuman day.

04:14Okay. Let’s say it’s a typical four-hour workday of prospecting, between Monday through Friday.

04:21How many appointments would you anticipate setting in that period of time?

Nate Clark04:25

Probably three to five listing appointments.

Aaron Wittenstein04:27

Three to five listing appointments in a week. Yeah. So basically your .75 to one a day is basically what we’re looking at right now.

Nate Clark04:32

Pretty much, yeah.

Aaron Wittenstein04:33

Okay. Yeah. And let’s just go in the middle. Let’s say you set four appointments. Okay, let’s just say you set four appointments. Out of those, how many listings will you take based upon setting four appointments?

Nate Clark04:44

I would say I would take three-quarters to a listing out of those.

04:48I definitely, at this point, am focusing a lot on qualifying out some of those appointments. So probably two of those I would really be focusing on qualifying out based on price and motivation, because a lot of sellers, as stuff has adjusted as much as it has, don’t really have realistic figures in terms of the sale price, in terms of realistic market expectations.

05:05I would 100% rather be on my dialer making stuff happen than driving 45 minutes away to an appointment that isn’t totally qualified. So protect your time as well, right? Just because you can get in front of somebody does not mean that that’s gonna result in a saleable listing. So it’s important to have the prequalification for these appointments built in, and that’s something that I think that I’m leaning into more and having more effectiveness with my appointments and the appointments that I’m setting.

05:32So focusing on qualifying the appointments that I have is something that I’m really focusing on, really hammering home at this stage in my business right now.

Aaron Wittenstein05:40

You just threw, like, 37 things at me and I have, like, 46 things I wanna talk about now about that. So let me just…

05:49You’re a numbers guy. I’ve become a numbers guy in my old age. So what you’re telling me right now, you said four appointments a week. That should come out to be at least one, a listing taken a week.

05:58You do that 40 weeks out of the year, that’s 40 listings. Average sale price of $500,000.

06:03That’s a lot of money. It’s a lot of money. It’s a lot of

Nate Clark06:08

money.

Aaron Wittenstein06:09

And that’s… I mean, I was thinking about this the other day, Mr. Clark, is that we get paid to sit on the phone-

06:17for three to four hours a day-

06:19and make more money than… I mean, are you in agreement with me on that?

Nate Clark06:23

Oh, 100%. 100%. Because I paid for an econ degree that I’m sure as heck not using right now. So I can’t imagine paying for, you know, the graduate degrees to make the same level of income. Granted, it’s all about, right, money isn’t the be all, end all of everything. It’s about the utility we get out of our lifestyles and what we’re doing and the impact we’re making.

06:39I love being able to work from home, to grow my business, focus on developing myself, my skills, focus on building the business, building the systems and processes, improving the technology, increasing efficiency, you know, bringing in assistants and eventually growing a team. So I love the fact that I have the opportunity to do this every single day.

06:58And I know that because the first couple listings that I got when I became an agent in Texas in 2016, I got by door knocking. And you’re not gonna catch me door knocking out there right now because the heat index is gonna be about 115 degrees by 2:00 PM. So we have tremendous opportunity, and if you can figure out how to structure your day like we have, you know, having good people that we cold call with and we keep each other accountable, it makes it super, super fun.

07:21It’s just like hanging out with your friends, making lots of money, and I don’t think there’s anything that’s better than that.

Aaron Wittenstein07:27

No, definitely not. Right? And a hundred percent. No, you know I agree with you. So I personally, I enjoy… I don’t say this about many people. I enjoy listening to you on the phone.

07:37I really do. I think you have a phenomenal way about you. And would you do the honor of doing a quick… I know I’m putting you on the spot here. Doing a quick role play with me. Would you be cool doing that?

Nate Clark07:48

New expired?

Aaron Wittenstein07:48

Yeah, let’s do a new expired.

Nate Clark07:50

Ring, ring.

Aaron Wittenstein07:51

Hello.

Nate Clark07:51

Hey, is this Aaron?

Aaron Wittenstein07:53

This is. How can I help you?

Nate Clark07:54

Hey, Aaron, this is Nate. I’m a local realtor. How is your Monday going, man? I hope you’re staying cool so far.

Aaron Wittenstein08:00

Yeah, it’s going good. It’s going good. You’re, like, the 17th agent to call me within the last hour. What’s going on?

Nate Clark08:04

I’m glad to hear some other people are working.

08:06Aaron, I was actually just calling about your place at 123 Embargo Street. I just saw it had come off of the market earlier this morning, and I wasn’t sure if it got sold and they didn’t mark it off or, you know, if it had come off of the market and it was still available.

Aaron Wittenstein08:20

No, it came off the market.

08:21You know, we had it up for a while, it didn’t sell. And, you know, I think we’re just… I don’t think, I know we’re just gonna sit tight for probably the next-

08:28know, next little bit.

Nate Clark08:30

I mean, those interest rates, they just tripled, it felt like, in a matter of months, and it really cramped our style.

08:34So I’m totally with you on that. This is a beautiful house you have in here. I love the woodwork, I love this upgraded tile that you have in the kitchen. So it sounds like you were up for a little while. Did you get any offers on it? Were you getting any traction, or did you just feel like you were just spinning your wheels?

Aaron Wittenstein08:49

We had one offer that was just horrible.

08:51And other than that, we didn’t get any… I mean, we never heard from a realtor, you know what I mean? It was just like a disaster situation.

Nate Clark08:57

It was, like, one of those investors who wants to pay 60 cents on the dollar, come in, throw something at a wall, and see what sticks.

09:02And you’re like, what am I buying that I would ever sell it for that? So I’m totally with you. So it sounds like it was a bit frustrating. Let me ask, if you had sold, where is it that you were going? Were you staying local? Were you getting outta Dodge, going bigger or smaller?

09:13What does that look like?

Aaron Wittenstein09:15

We’re going to Dallas, actually. We’re moving to Dallas.

Nate Clark09:17

Nice. Dallas. Very cool. Go Boys. Go Boys. Awesome. What brings you to Dallas? You got family out there? Going back home?

Aaron Wittenstein09:24

We just, we went there once and, you know, we just fell in love with it.

Nate Clark09:30

10-4.

09:30I can totally understand that. So is this something where, you know, if you could get an offer, obviously at the right price for you, and get yourself moved up to Dallas in the next three or six months, is that something that would be a win for you, Aaron, if we were looking at it?

Aaron Wittenstein09:42

Yeah. That’s good. Yeah, I mean, I guess, but like I said, why don’t you just give me a call back in, like, two months.

Nate Clark09:49

Absolutely. And you say that, are you planning on wanting to start selling in two months, or do you wanna be sold in two months? What’s the sort of timeframe look like? ‘Cause it sounds like Dallas would be a pretty appealing place for you to get yourself and the family up to.

Aaron Wittenstein10:00

You know, I mean, like I said, two months we want to have it back on the market.

10:03You know, we may list with the same realtor. So there’s a lot of options right now.

Nate Clark10:08

I totally understand that, and I hear that from so many people, and I think it’s awesome that you have a good relationship with your previous agent. You know, just for your knowledge, about 70% of the clients I work with are in exactly your position, where it failed to sell the first time around.

10:24You know, if by, let’s say, advertising it in more MLSs, running some really good Facebook, Google PPC and some additional ads, by getting a little bit more traction so we could actually get you the figure that you’re looking for, is that something that you’d be looking to talk about so we could get you sold in the next two months?

Aaron Wittenstein10:41

Yeah, that’s fine. I’d be open to that conversation.

Nate Clark10:44

Awesome. Then why don’t we do this? If we were gonna get together for 15 or 20 minutes to kinda go over a couple of things, which would typically be better for your schedule? Usually, are you more available in the afternoon?

10:55Is it just in the evenings, or is it only on weekdays?

Aaron Wittenstein10:58

Afternoon’s fine. Okay. Here’s what I wanna point, again, across with the way that Nate spoke, okay? Is he’s very smooth. Okay? Very smooth. And that comes from practice, right? And that’s what I want you guys to keep in mind is… Nate, how long have you been prospecting? Not like hours today, but, like, in totality.

11:16How long have you been practicing, or how long have you been role-playing for?

Nate Clark11:21

That would be over-

Aaron Wittenstein11:22

Or role-playing… I’m sorry, calling for.

Nate Clark11:24

Over five years at this point. It would be, yeah, five and a half years, basically.

Aaron Wittenstein11:28

Okay. Now, are you role-playing on a regular basis, or is it pretty much, like, did you do that at the beginning, or what did that look like?

Nate Clark11:33

So at the start I script practiced, I role-played tremendously, and at this point I just focus on getting up, getting that energy really good and getting on the dialer right away, and as soon as I have one or two conversations for the day… If you’re doing this four or five hours a day, multiple days out of the week, the buttery smooth conversations will flow to you.

11:55But 100%, when you’re starting out, knowing all of your scripts inside and out, being able to recite them at speed, just so you have all the words kind of remembered and lined up and everything, is absolutely something that I was doing a ton of when I first started making the calls.

Aaron Wittenstein12:08

Well, ’cause I mean, it’s just with time. It’s task over time.

12:12Yep. Yep. And you just eventually get better, and then you just get, by just doing the activity, you know-

Nate Clark12:17

It’s the 10,000-hour rule, right? You’re never gonna be an expert in anything until you spend 10,000 hours in it. So at the very least, you know, get the reps in a lot to start out with. And what I would encourage people is whatever you have in terms of an ideal contact goal, double down and triple down on that, and you’ll start to see a lot more results as you really stack those numbers up.

12:37It’s all a numbers game, and contacts equals contracts.

Aaron Wittenstein12:40

100%. No, that’s definitely the way it should go. So all right. So I mean, looking into your business, okay? So do you have, like, a system that you go through on a daily basis where, like, I call this, I call this-

12:55I call this, I call that? Like, what does that look like?

Nate Clark12:58

Absolutely. So at this point, the bulk of my business, if I could have one lead source to prospect until the end of time and turn off everything else, it would be fresh expireds, 100%. I love fresh expireds. I love hitting them first thing when they come off the market.

13:13You know, the first day I’m hitting them at 8:00 AM, I’m dialing them again in the afternoon and in the evening. But ultimately, expireds are gonna be my number one priority. Even in a market like Austin, I still found that two thirds of my business was coming from that. And especially with the market shifting, prices shifting, and a ton of inventory coming off of the market and expiring, that’s been something where I’ve been able to take five expired listings in a month at a couple points this year.

13:39So expireds are always gonna be my first and foremost. I also do a ton of circle prospecting. I love circle prospecting, and I do it to a pretty high degree. So what I like to do as a rule of thumb, and this is just something that I kind of discovered in the last six months or so, is I really like calling expireds until I can no longer hit at least five contacts an hour, at which point I’ll typically switch over to circle prospecting, and then just be choosing the neighborhoods that I wanna sell listings in and just blasting them until I can get 50 or 100 or even 150 total contacts.

14:12So I would always start out with the fresh expireds. I will continue dialing my expired list, even my old expired list, until I’m not able to really get at least five contacts an hour, at which point I’ll usually switch over to my lower priority lists, which, because they’re not getting dialed as much, I know that I can get a higher contact rate out of, I know I can get more contacts per hour.

14:33And while expireds and FSBOs are really good, you know, low-hanging fruits to pick… If you think of an orchard and all the apples have been picked off the lowest branches of the tree, well, maybe you need to reach a little bit higher up as you’re trying to find the one low-hanging one that’s still on the orchard.

14:50So I really do like circle prospecting. I think that that’s something that is a tremendous tool for people to use.

Aaron Wittenstein14:57

And here’s what I, like you said, what I know about you as well, is that you work kind of a vast area, if you will, as well, right? How many MLSs are you working right now?

Nate Clark15:05

I work three different MLSs. I’m in the Austin Board of Realtors MLS, the San Antonio Board of Realtors MLS, and we also have the Central Texas MLS that basically comprises the area between Austin and San Antonio, and then just north of Austin, kind of in Temple and Killeen. So I work a very large geographic radius, and I basically take listings within probably a 90-minute radius of where I live at.

15:26Then when I have buyers, I either work them or refer them here more hyper locally to Austin. Yeah, so that’s why I actually… Most people, when they’re always asking about Vulcan7, and I’m a big proponent of Vulcan7, I’ve used Vulcan7 for over five years at this point.

15:43People are always comparing the cost, and, you know, everything is about what you pay versus what you get for it. But I always tell people that I’m paying for two Vulcan7 accounts because I’m getting expireds off of two different MLSs, and I’m perfectly happy to do so and continue doing so because it’s a great resource for me.

16:01And especially when you’re spending four or five hours a day prospecting and you’re spending your time on the phones, you’re already putting the dollar value of your time per hour putting your butt in the chair and putting the headset in your ear. So why have bad data that you’re calling, where you’re getting five bad numbers and maybe one good number, as opposed to one or two good numbers that you can just bang through and set your listing appointments.

Aaron Wittenstein16:25

All right, so people that are new to calling expireds, what… Give me, like, one thing that you would advise them on calling brand new. ‘Cause like you said, you’re having really good success with it. So brand new expireds, what’s one piece of advice that you have for that?

Nate Clark16:39

I would say don’t get worried when people get angry, because I get frustrated when people call me out of the blue.

16:44But as soon as you say one or two things to build the slightest bit of rapport, give me a little bit of energy showing me that you’re not a complete robot, I’m gonna respond more favorably to that. So about 30 minutes before we got off, I didn’t set an appointment, but I got a great nurture follow-up lead that I’m gonna contact for this next springtime to probably relist her house when hopefully stuff has stabilized a little bit.

17:04And that was somebody who really off the bat was not receptive, and just by being nice, smiling, having good energy as you’re making those calls, that’s all stuff that transmits over the phone. And especially as you stack the reps and be making good calls.

17:20I don’t know about you, but I find all the time when I’m calling, even if somebody’s, like, being a jerk to me on the phone, I just have this smile, like, creeping onto my face, because I think it’s so cool that we’re able to do what we do. And that energy comes across, and being a human and not being a salesperson comes across to people.

17:35So don’t worry too much when people are kind of gruff when they get you right on the phone and you ask for them by name and they go, “Yeah, who are you?” Just lean into it, have a nice script, have a little bit of energy, you know, say something about, “Here we’re all getting baked alive right now,” so that’s what my line is on everything.

17:52“Well, hey, you know, it’s Nate, I’m a local realtor. How’s your Monday going? I hope you’re staying cool so far.” And so kind of leaning into that personal connection is something that will have a huge effect, and just being really friendly to people, having good energy.

18:04If you’re pissed off, don’t pick up the phone. Get yourself in a better mind state. Go have a coffee, go meditate, go to the gym. Do what you need to do to get your energy level right.

Aaron Wittenstein18:12

I teach my son this as well. It’s not what you say-

18:15it’s how you say it. And like I said, I’m gonna defer to you again.

18:20Not defer to you, I’m gonna just give you a compliment, is the way that you say things come off very nice and very friendly. And that’s the reason, in my opinion, you’re having so much success with what you’re doing. Because Austin alone, like I said, other than Florida, there are so many realtors in Austin, Texas.

18:36All right. So let me ask you this. I always like to find this out. A brand new agent, fresh off of licensing, walks by your office, knocks on your door and says, “Nate Clark, what’s one piece of advice that you can give me, please?”

Nate Clark18:53

Talk to 100 people every single day. Okay. If you talk to 100 people every single day, you can throw the weekends out and you’re still talking to 500 people a week, is 2,000 people a month, is 24,000 people a year.

19:09If you can’t get business talking to 24,000 people, then you can give up and go do whatever job you were gonna flip to instead anyways. But so many people… I mean, you can make use of your SOI, which is great. I think that’s a great tactic for people. But having a lead gen mindset is something that got developed in me by being an agent in Austin when I grew up in Boston, Massachusetts.

19:32I didn’t know anybody down here, and that lack of, you know, connection and a network and an SOI turned into just a lead gen and prospecting-based mindset, and talking to 100 people a day is basically what I started out doing, and that has gotten me to where I’m at now.

Aaron Wittenstein19:50

Exactly. So this business, I hate to say it, it’s context for it, I hate to say that, but it’s so true.

19:56It’s, you know, if you don’t talk to enough people-

Nate Clark19:58

It’s not bad. It’s not bad. Don’t think it’s terrible. I’m not some super extroverted person that’s just out talking to all people all the time. But prospecting is not bad. It’s not hard. You have a script. You have your computer. You have a phone.

20:11Get outside your comfort zone, start doing it, and after a day or two you realize it’s a lot less scary than you thought, and you are probably beyond, like, 95% of agents in terms of actionable business-building skills that they pick up. Because most agents are like, “I wanna work for myself. I wanna have time flexibility.

20:26I wanna make a ton of money.” Well, if you can make yourself have the time schedule to stick to some good prospecting for a couple of hours every day and talk to a bunch of people and try and focus on prospecting for listings… I’m usually off, I go to the gym and go swimming in the afternoons. I go hang out at the springs, and then I come back and do a bit of evening work.

20:47But it’s the best way to build a lean business, to build a business from the start, and to build one that allows for time flexibility.

Aaron Wittenstein20:54

100%. And like I said earlier, where else can you work three to four hours a day and have the kind, I don’t wanna say money, have the kind of opportunities that we have?

21:03Yes. You know, that’s really the way that I look at this with what we do, okay? So Mr. Clark, I wanna say thank you so much for coming on and hanging out with us today. And guys, just remember, we’re here every single week with Vulcan7 Roadmap. Do me a favor, go make some money.

21:17Take care. Thanks, Nate.